Wednesday, 17 May 2017

GRAHAM: OK. Do you stand by your testimony that there is an active investigation counterintelligence investigation regarding Trump campaign individuals in the Russian government as to whether not to collaborate? You said that in March...

COMEY: To see if there was any coordination between the Russian effort and peoples...

GRAHAM: Is that still going on?

COMEY: Yes.

GRAHAM: OK. So nothing's changed. You stand by those two statements?

COMEY: Correct. ……

SEN. RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, D-CONN.: Thanks. Thank you Mr. Chairman. Thank you Director Comey for being here and thank you to you and the men and women who work with you at the FBI for their extraordinary service to our country, much of it unappreciated as you've wrote so powerfully in your opening statement. You have confirmed, I believe, that the FBI is investigating potential ties between Trump Associates and the Russian interference in the 2016 campaign, correct?

COMEY: Yes.

BLUMENTHAL: And you have not, to my knowledge, ruled out anyone in the Trump campaign as potentially a target of that criminal investigation, correct?

COMEY: Well, I haven't said anything publicly about who we've opened investigations on, I briefed the chair and ranking on who those people are. And so I can't -- I can't go beyond that in this setting.[FBI Director James B. Comey responds to a questions from Senator Lindsey Graham (Republican-South Carolina) and Senator Richard Blumenthal (Democrat-Connecticut) during the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee investigation into “Oversight of the Federal Bureau of Investigation”, commencing 10am US EDT 3 May 2017, transcript published in The Washington Post]

With
respect to the Russian investigation, we treated it like we did with the
Clinton investigation. We didn't say a word about it until months into it and
then the only thing we've confirmed so far about this is the same thing with
the Clinton investigation. That we are investigating. And I would expect, we're
not going to say another peep about it until we're done. And I don't know what
will be said when we're done, but that's the way we handled the Clinton
investigation as well…….

In
that particular investigation, my judgment was that it — that the appearance of
fairness and independence required that it be removed from the political chain
of command within the Department of Justice, because as you recall, it seems
like a lifetime ago. But that also involved the conduct of people who were
senior-level people in the White House, and my judgment was that even I, as an
independent-minded person, was a political appointee and so I ought to give it
to a career person like Pat Fitzgerald.

The
Russians used cyber operations against both political parties, including
hacking into servers used by the Democratic National Committee and releasing
stolen data to WikiLeaks and other media outlets. Russia also collected on
certain Republican Party- affiliated targets, but did not release any
Republican-related data. The Intelligence Community Assessment concluded first
that President Putin directed and influenced campaign to erode the faith and
confidence of the American people in our presidential election process. Second,
that he did so to demean Secretary Clinton, and third, that he sought to
advantage Mr. Trump. These conclusions were reached based on the richness of
the information gathered and analyzed and were thoroughly vetted and then
approved by the directors of the three agencies and me.[JAMES
R. CLAPPER JR., former Director Of National Intelligence August2010–January
2017, giving evidence before theU.S.
Senate Judiciary Committee investigation into “Russian Interference in the 2016
United States Election”, commencing 4.30am AEST 9 May 2017, transcript
published inThe
Washington Post]

When the
Intelligence Community obtains information suggesting that a U.S. person is
acting on behalf of a foreign power, the standard procedure is to share that
information with the FBI. The Bureau then decides whether to look into that
information and handles any ensuing investigation, if there is one.

Given its
sensitivity, even the existence of a counterintelligence investigation is
closely held, including at the highest levels. During my tenure as DNI, it was
my practice to defer to the FBI Director – both Director Mueller and Director
Comey – on whether, when, and to what extent they would inform me about such
investigations. This stems from the unique position of the FBI, which straddles
both intelligence and law enforcement. As a consequence, I was not aware of the
counterintelligence investigation Director Comey first referred to during his
testimony before the House intelligence committee on March 20th, and that
comports with my public statements. [JAMES R. CLAPPER, former Director of
National Intelligence, giving evidence before the U.S. Committee
On The Judiciary Subcommittee On Crime And Terrorism United States
Senate investigation into “Russian Interference in the 2016 United States
Election”, 8 May 2017, transcript]

I had two in-person meetings and one phone call with the White House Counsel about Mr. Flynn. The first meeting occurred on January 26, called Don McGahn first thing that morning and told him that I had a very sensitive matter that I needed to discuss with him, that I couldn't talk about it on the phone and that I needed to come see him. And he agreed to meet with me later that afternoon.

I took a senior member of the national security division who was overseeing this matter with me to meet with Mr. McGahn. We met in his office at the White House which is a skiff (ph) so we could discuss classified information in his office. We began our meeting telling him that there had been press accounts of statements from the vice president and others that related conduct that Mr. Flynn had been involved in that we knew not to be the truth.

And as I - as I tell you what happened here, again I'm going to be very careful not to reveal classified information…..

So I told them again that there were a number of press accounts of statements that had been made by the vice president and other high-ranking White House officials about General Flynn's conduct that we knew to be untrue. And we told them how we knew that this - how we had this information, how we had acquired it, and how we knew that it was untrue.

And we walked the White House Counsel who also had an associate there with him through General Flynn's underlying conduct, the contents of which I obviously cannot go through with you today because it's classified. But we took him through in a fair amount of detail of the underlying conduct, what General Flynn had done, and then we walked through the various press accounts and how it had been falsely reported.

We also told the White House Counsel that General Flynn had been interviewed by the FBI on February 24. Mr. McGahn asked me how he did and I declined to give him an answer to that. And we then walked through with Mr. McGahn essentially why we were telling them about this and the first thing we did was to explain to Mr. McGahn that the underlying conduct that General Flynn had engaged in was problematic in and of itself.

Secondly, we told him we felt like the vice president and others were entitled to know that the information that they were conveying to the American people wasn't true. And we wanted to make it really clear right out of the gate that we were not accusing Vice President Pence of knowingly providing false information to the American people.

And, in fact, Mr. McGahn responded back to me to let me know that anything that General Flynn would've said would have been based -- excuse me -- anything that Vice President Pence would have said would have been based on what General Flynn had told him.

We told him the third reason was -- is because we were concerned that the American people had been misled about the underlying conduct and what General Flynn had done, and additionally, that we weren't the only ones that knew all of this, that the Russians also knew about what General Flynn had done.

And the Russians also knew that General Flynn had misled the vice president and others, because in the media accounts, it was clear from the vice president and others that they were repeating what General Flynn had told them, and that this was a problem because not only did we believe that the Russians knew this, but that they likely had proof of this information.

And that created a compromise situation, a situation where the national security adviser essentially could be blackmailed by the Russians. Finally, we told them that we were giving them all of this information so that they could take action, the action that they deemed appropriate.

I remember that Mr. McGahn asked me whether or not General Flynn should be fired, and I told him that that really wasn't our call, that was up to them, but that we were giving them this information so that they could take action, and that was the first meeting.

[SALLY C. YATES, former Deputy U.S. Attorney-General & former Acting Attorney-General January 2015-January 2017,giving evidence before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee investigation into “Russian Interference in the 2016 United States Election”, commencing4.30am AEST 9 May 2017, transcript published in The Washington Post]

HOLT: Monday, you met with Deputy Attorney General Rod
Rosenstein. Did you ask for a recommendation?TRUMP: What I did was, I was going to fire. My decision. I was not...HOLT: You’d made the decision before they came into the room?TRUMP: I was going to fire Comey. There’s no good time to do it by the way.HOLT: In your letter, you said, ‘I accept their recommendation.’ TRUMP: Oh, I was going to fire, regardless of recommendation. He
made a recommendation, he’s highly respected — very good guy, very smart guy.
And the Democrats like him, Republicans like him. He made a recommendation, but
regardless of recommendation, I was going to fire Comey. [Excerpt from NBC News Lester Holt interview with Donald Trump on 11 May 2017]

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NSW North Coast

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Moggy Musings

Hi! My name is Boy. I'm a male bi-coloured tabby cat. Ever since I discovered that Malcolm Turnbull's dogs were allowed to blog, I have been pestering Clarencegirl to allow me a small space on North Coast Voices.

A false flag musing: I have noticed one particular voice on Facebook which is Pollyanna-positive on the subject of the Port of Yamba becoming a designated cruise ship destination. What this gentleman doesn’t disclose is that, as a principal of Middle Star Pty Ltd, he could be thought to have a potential pecuniary interest due to the fact that this corporation (which has had an office in Grafton since 2012) provides consultancy services and tourismbusiness development services.

A religion & local government musing: On 11 October 2017 Clarence Valley Council has the Church of Jesus Christ Development Fund Inc in Sutherland Local Court No. 6 for a small claims hearing. It would appear that there may be a little issue in rendering unto Caesar. On 19 September 2017 an ordained minister of a religion (which was named by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in relation to 40 instances of historical child sexual abuse on the NSW North Coast) read the Opening Prayer at Council’s ordinary monthly meeting. Earlier in the year an ordained minister (from a church network alleged to have supported an overseas orphanage closed because of child abuse claims in 2013) read the Opening Prayer and an ordained minister (belonging to yet another church network accused of ignoring child sexual abuse in the US and racism in South Africa) read the Opening Prayer at yet another ordinary monthly meeting. Nice one councillors - you are covering yourselves with glory!

An investigative musing: Newcastle Herald, 12 August 2017: The state’s corruption watchdog has been asked to investigate the finances of the Awabakal Aboriginal Local Land Council, less than 12 months after the troubled organisation was placed into administration by the state government. The Newcastle Herald understands accounting firm PKF Lawler made the decision to refer the land council to the Independent Commission Against Corruption after discovering a number of irregularities during an audit of its financial statements.The results of the audit were recently presented to a meeting of Awabakal members. Administrator Terry Lawler did not respond when contacted by the Herald and a PKF Lawler spokesperson said it was unable to comment on the matter. Given the intricate web of company relationships that existed with at least one former board member it is not outside the realms of possibility that, if ICAC accepts this referral, then United Land Councils Limited (registered New Zealand) and United First Peoples Syndications Pty Ltd(registered Australia) might be interviewed. North Coast Voices readers will remember that on 15 August 2015 representatives of these two companied gave evidence before NSW Legislative Council General Purpose Standing Committee No. 6 INQUIRY INTO CROWN LAND. This evidence included advocating for a Yamba mega port.

A Nationals musing: Word around the traps is that NSW Nats MP for Clarence Chris Gulaptis has been talking up the notion of cruise ships visiting the Clarence River estuary. Fair dinkum! That man can be guaranteed to run with any bad idea put to him. I'm sure one or more cruise ships moored in the main navigation channel on a regular basis for one, two or three days is something other regular river users will really welcome. *pause for appreciation of irony* The draft of the smallest of the smaller cruise vessels is 3 metres and it would only stay safely afloat in that channel. Even the Yamba-Iluka ferry has been known to get momentarily stuck in silt/sand from time to time in Yamba Bay and even a very small cruise ship wouldn't be able to safely enter and exit Iluka Bay. You can bet your bottom dollar operators of cruise lines would soon be calling for dredging at the approach to the river mouth - and you know how well that goes down with the local residents.

A local councils musing: Which Northern Rivers council is on a low-key NSW Office of Local Government watch list courtesy of feet dragging by a past general manager?

A serial pest musing: I'm sure the Clarence Valley was thrilled to find that a well-known fantasist is active once again in the wee small hours of the morning treading a well-worn path of accusations involving police, local business owners and others.

An investigative musing: Which NSW North Coast council is batting to have the longest running code of conduct complaint investigation on record?

A which bank? musing: Despite a net profit last year of $9,227 million the Commonwealth Bank still insists on paying below Centrelink deeming rates interest on money held in Pensioner Security Accounts. One local wag says he’s waiting for the first bill from the bank charging him for the privilege of keeping his pension dollars at that bank.

A Daily Examiner musing: Just when you thought this newspaper could sink no lower under News Corp management, it continues to give column space to Andrew Bolt.

A thought to ponder musing: In case of bushfire or flood - do you have an emergency evacuation plan for the family pet?

An adoption musing: Every week on the NSW North Coast a number of cats and dogs find themselves without a home. If you want to do your bit and give one bundle of joy a new family, contact Happy Paws on 0419 404 766 or your local council pound.